Northeastern University
EN-3: Student Life

Civil & Environmental Engineering Graduate Student Council (CEE GSC)
Aims to be a bridge that unifies all CEE concentrations in a way that fosters fellowship - collaborate in academic and non-academic settings through sharing of cultures, research, and general interests.

Cruelty Free Northeastern
Dedicated to animal advocacy and plant-based diets on campus and in the greater Boston area.

Energy Systems Society (ESS)
Bridge the gap between industry and academia, as well as development and sustainability. Aims to align with the interdisciplinary pillars of sustainability: Engineering, Business, and Policy. Hosts an annual conference each Fall.

Engineers Without Borders
Working with communities in Guatemala, Uganda and Panama to provide accessible drinking water.

Global Medical Brigades
Work with licensed medical professionals and community health workers to provide comprehensive health services in rural communities with limited access to healthcare. Current partners are Greece and Honduras. Chapter focus is to raise funds and supplies needed for Northeastern students to engage with communities abroad, while also gaining valuable insight into global development and building sustainable solutions abroad.

Global Public Health Brigades (GPHB)
Work with licensed medical professionals and community health workers to provide comprehensive health services in rural communities with limited access to healthcare. Current partners are Greece and Honduras. Chapter focus is to raise funds and supplies needed for Northeastern students to engage with communities abroad, while also gaining valuable insight into global development and building sustainable solutions abroad.

Graduate Environmental and Geo-Environmental Students (GEGES)
University volunteers and local teams work with partner communities to create sustainable resources through a holistic approach of multiple interdisciplinary brigades: water, agriculture, public health, microfinance, and even human rights.

Husky Energy Action Team (HEAT)
Student group working towards environmental sustainability and carbon neutrality at Northeastern University. Raises awareness, works with administration to advance sustainability initiatives, hosts events promoting responsible use of energy and waste. Includes “incubator” clubs such as CANU (Composting at Northeastern) and Divest NU promoting divestment from fossil fuels.

Marine Biology Club
Strives to foster and engage students with interests in marine biology, environmental science, ecology, evolution, and behavior by providing educational, recreational, and professional opportunities in correlation with the Marine Science Center.

Net Impact NU
Global community of 100,000 students and professionals who take on social challenges, protect the environment, invest new products and orient business for the greater good through educational events and hands-on learned experiences.

Northeastern Garden Club
After developing on campus garden beds in the Fall of 2021, the Student Garden Club formed to help manage and care for the raised bed gardens. They hosted a “Garden Party” kickoff for the Club during Earth Week 2022.

Northeastern Socialist Alternative
National organization fighting in our workplaces, communities, and campuses against the exploitation and injustices people face every day. We are community activists fighting against budget cuts in public services; we are activists campaigning for a $15/hour minimum wage and fighting for democratic unions.

Northeastern University Chapter of the New England Water Environment Association
Organization dedicated to connecting students and professionals involved in the water environment profession.

NUAPPS NU (Association of Public Policy Students)
Serves as an academic, professional, and social community for the School of Public Policy and Urban Affairs'(SPPUA) graduate students. SPPUA drives interdisciplinary thinking and problem solving on issues of pressing concern – from transportation, housing, energy and community development to social and environmental justice, resilience and sustainability.

NUITE (Institute of Transportation Engineers)
Mission is to enrich the depth and breadth of knowledge of the Transportation Engineering students at Northeastern University in the areas of transportation systems engineering and research through interaction with the larger engineering community.

NUSBO - Sustainable Buildings Organization
Seeks to engage and connect students and professionals interested in the field of sustainable building. Organizes weekly talks with leading industry professional.

Partners in Health
Mission is to provide a preferential option for the poor in health care. Two overarching goals: to bring the benefits of modern medical science to those most in need of them and to serve as an antidote to despair.

Progressive Student Alliance
This group is a local affiliate of United Students Against Sweatshops that organizes for student and worker power on our campus and beyond. They formed the Huskies Organizing with Labor (HOWL) in support of dining workers.

ReThink the Drink
Encourages members of the NU community to “rethink” their consumption of sugary beverages and switch to water, thus reducing caloric intake and ultimately obesity. Members have promoted to increase the number of water bottle filling stations on campus.

Student Government Association
SGA is the representative body serving to help all undergraduate students and to change our campus for the better. The group includes a Green Initiatives Board to promote sustainability projects and ideas on campus.

Slow Food NU
Promotes an increased awareness of the interconnectedness of food, the environment, and human health through deliberate and meaningful service projects, educational events, and transformative dialogue.

Social Enterprise Institute Student Association SEISA
Believes business can be a powerful tool in helping to alleviate poverty in the developing world by utilizing enterprise-based solutions.

Soil4Climate NU
Chapters to help spread the hopeful message of soil as a climate mitigation solution.

Students of Environmental and Water Resources Engineering, Research & Sustainability (SEWERS)
Group is to serve as an organizational vehicle for educational and social events for environmental graduate students including student presentations, seminar guest presentations, outings/field trips, and networking with other universities.

Sunrise Movement Northeastern University
A new student group working to stop climate change and create millions of good jobs in the process. They work to encourage Northeastern students to get involved in climate activism and to support other movements in the fight for justice for all!

Terra Society
Provide students with a chance to work with professors in the Earth & Environmental Sciences department and network with students in similar disciplines such as ecology, environmental science, marine science, geology, environmental studies, and sustainability.

Trash 2 Treasure NU
Promotes the reduction of waste and reuse and repurposing of clothing, furniture, home appliances and accessories, etc. Anything not sold to NU students is donated to local charities to be repurposed and recycled.

UNICEF NU
Survival and development for the most vulnerable child populations and educating about/supporting sustainable solutions to child poverty.

https://studentlife.northeastern.edu/

In fall of 2021, fifteen raised garden beds were installed behind Snell Library, allowing access to growing fruits and vegetables for students. Northeastern contracted with Green City Growers to work with the students in their gardens and help educate them on all of the nuances of growing crops in the city. A new student organization, the NU Garden Club, has formed to help ensure the success of these garden beds.

There is also a plot in a community garden next to campus that Northeastern students have regularly used for more than a decade. Significant work on the garden is done each year by the Northeastern Landscape Department, to help its upkeep, implement improvements, and generally as a community service. The plot used by students offers them opportunities to collaborate and interact with community members from the surrounding neighborhoods.

Northeastern’s Slow Food student group organizes a Community Supported Agriculture program through local farms each year. This allows students to easily sign up for a CSA share to receive fresh fruits and vegetables and pick-up the food on campus.

https://news.northeastern.edu/2021/10/25/new-vegetable-gardens-behind-snell-library/

NU WISE: The Women’s Interdisciplinary Society of Entrepreneurship (WISE) is a student-led group at Northeastern University dedicated to helping women and non-binary folks develop an innovative mindset through interactive workshops, a thought-incubator, mentorship pairings and a venture catalyst.
Website: https://giving.northeastern.edu/WISE/

The Idea Gap Funding program within the student-led "Idea Venture Accelerator" Program offers microfinance help to newly evolving entrepreneurs including those engaged in socially responsible and environmental business ideas.
Website: https://www.northeastern.edu/idea/tag/gap-fund/

Myra Kraft Open Classroom is held every fall and spring term. Open to the entire University community and the public, it addresses sustainability in relation to many topics including food systems, politics, transportation, materials management, and energy/climate. The Spring 2022 series, titled “Power to the People: Community Voices in Urban Decision-Making,” explored a variety of community-centered research initiatives grounded in racial and social justice values and a commitment to working with community members as co-equals. The April event provided an introduction to the Northeastern Climate Justice & Sustainability Hub and explored the University’s role in the climate justice movement.

In 2020, the series focused on promoting climate change education, resilience, and action. The courses examined the basic science of climate change, its local and global impacts on the natural world, the built environment, and humankind, and strategies for preventing its worst outcomes while preparing for those we can no longer avoid.

Website: https://cssh.northeastern.edu/myra-kraft-open-classroom/

As a part of the Climate Justice Action Plan, the Hub hosted a Community Conversation on Climate in October of 2021 that engaged students, faculty and staff on climate justice and sustainability. Attendees identified their priorities and concerns for Northeastern in the climate justice movement and provided recommendations for action in several different topic areas including energy, buildings, waste, transportation, resiliency and engagement.

Website: https://facilities.northeastern.edu/sustainability/cjap/

NU Energy Systems Society hosts and annual energy conference to serve as a knowledge transference platform for students with some of the finest energy experts waiting to shed light on some of the pressing issues in the energy industry.

https://www.nuess.us/

Northeastern offers sustainability-focused public art, exhibits and performances through the 360 Art Gallery and Theater and the College of Arts, Media and Design.
Recent examples include:
“A Thread, Extended”, shown in 2022 in 360 Art Gallary, explores embodied forms of wayfinding, drawing on familial labor, somatic experience, oral histories, and ecological research to surface the marks we make on the landscape, and how it marks and makes us in return.

"Dream Boston" was exhibited in the 360 Art Gallery in 2021 on racial justice and COVID.

"Urinetown" was performed in 2020 in the performing arts theater on the globally warmed future where water shortages mean private toilets are corporate- owned and the poor must pay to urinate.

https://camd.northeastern.edu/cfa/center-for-the-arts-exhibitions/

The Northeastern Huskies Outdoor Club's primary purpose includes encouraging outdoor recreation and education. Active efforts are made to reach diverse audiences and make the outdoors more accessible and affordable to all. Additionally, service projects, programs and events are regularly scheduled to promote good stewardship that follow the Leave No Trace principles. Club members seeking lodge access must prove an understanding of LNT principles (among others) to receive the keys.

https://web.northeastern.edu/nuhoc/

The Climate Justice & Sustainability Hub collaborates with Residential Life to provide sustainability programming for Living Learning Communities (LLCs). Previously, there was a Green Living Learning Community that focused on increasing awareness and access to sustainability education and events around campus including a trivia bash, sustainable goal setting, and sustainable business tours around Boston.

Although the 2021-2022 school year did not have a Green LLC, it did have a Living Science LLC that also included sustainability programming. This LLC was selected for the first residential compost pilot which included educational programming and events on compost and sustainability. The Living Science LLC had a successful pilot which allowed the university to expand residential composting the following school year.

As an immersive/experiential school, each student is required to complete a cooperative education (Co-op) at their employer of choice, a full-time, six month program. By alternating semesters of academic study with periods of full-time work, students are able to transform work across academic and professional contexts. Many students use this opportunity to participate in a sustainability focused co-op across the globe including positions in clean energy, local social and environmental justice NGOs, government agencies, international development NGOs, and more. The Climate Justice & Sustainability Hub and the NU Arboretum teams host at least four co-op students a semester.

Our students also do work study, community service, and other volunteer opportunities in our community. Other NU departments and colleges also offer similar opportunities as research assistants, co-ops, work studies, individual research/faculty members' projects. Some of the hosting offices/departments include the Northeastern Environmental Justice Research Collaborative, the Global Resilience Institute, the D'More McKim School of Business, College of Engineering, and the Marine Science Center/Urban Coastal Resilience Institute.

https://facilities.northeastern.edu/sustainability/involved/

During April 2022, Northeastern University promoted over 20 environmental-related events to celebrate Earth Day throughout the month. These events ranged from lectures, seed plantings, and community discussions, to a concert, art show and arboretum tour. Many of these events were hosted by student groups who focus on various environmental and sustainability issues. The Climate Justice and Sustainability Hub also hosted a discussion panel on NU’s role in the climate justice movement which featured several members within the community, student body, and faculty. Similar events to the Earth Month calendar occur throughout the year as well.

There are over 35 student groups at Northeastern that address some aspect of sustainability into their mission, goals and programming. Over the past five years in particular, more incoming students, and students in general, seek sustainability as campus engagement activities and a way to impact the university during their time at Northeastern.